1.2.7-Lovethefutureisthine
Brick!Club 1.2.7 Today we are going to play my favorite game! And that favorite game is called “Ignorance is a disease. I am using the word in the sense of “being uninformed about something, either willfully on your own part or due to the will of someone else who has some aspect of control over you. Most everything else in the world that isn’t particularly pleasant is just a symptom of the disease. But the good news is that diseases can be cured and with that, there’s a good chance it will make the world a MUCH better place! “Society must necessarily look at these things because they created it. He was, as we have said, an ignorant man, but not weak-minded.” There’s a reason that the Amis fought for education. (because everything circles back to them, of course! But really because education and the gathering of information allows you to create your own opinions about anything, and strong opinions are what create change!) There’s a reason Valjean wanted to learn to read- you can’t fight anything, even if it is selfishly wanting to fight society, when uninformed. Valjean is uninformed about how to live honestly while supporting himself (and his family, though they are a rather moot point by this time.) Also he has forgotten how to love, if he ever truly understood in the first place. Valjean thinks that it is rare for a man to die of hunger, but I’m not sure I actually believe that. It seems to me that it’s sort of an old wives tale that has been spread through society to make those who have anything not feel guilty over sharing it. So they can continue to live in ignorance of the poor. I want to say that the court system is ignorant of what a long-term sentence can do to a family. Or do they just not care? “Jean Valjean was in darkness; he suffered in darkness and he hated in darkness.” This is important. His wrongs and the wrongs that were committed against him were the result of no one being informed of what was around them because it was difficult to see clearly. Or, ignorance. Hugo even mentions that knowledge is light earlier in the chapter. When he discusses that Valjean learned to read, even if it was to “strengthen his hatred,” he says “…light entered on one side, and darkness on the other.” Even then, since he is still not really sure how to live honestly (someone here, I think Sarah 1281? Had mentioned that he may have just planned to stay a habitual crook after release) and has forgotten how to love, only a “gloomy light…illumines his soul.” The biggest part of the big issue here is that he only knows how to hate, and that’s not enough knowledge to be constructive. He has a “hatred of human law; … a hatred of society, then a hatred of the human race, next a hatred of creation, and is expressed by a vague, incessant, and brutal desire to injure someone, no matter whom.” He doesn’t even know where to place his hatred, really. So yeah. Go inform yourselves but make sure that your process of informing yourself comes from a place of love for society, and if not, then teach yourself how to do it. After all, G- even says “Man has only one tyrant-ignorance.” And tyrants can (clearly) be overthrown. If any of that made sense. Somewhere down the line it turned into one of my badly-written academic papers. Although, to clarify, I don’t really make any type of well-written academic paper. Commentary Pilferingapples ..I think I have established that I will just roll around in a nice extended metaphor for ages, so thank you.